Today's News

Financially speaking, the wait is just about over for Central Florida Community College's new campus in Chiefland.

After delays and worries over funding, CFCC will receive $13 million for the construction of a new campus on U.S. Highway 19, about 4.5 miles north of the current Levy Center. All that remains is for Gov. Charlie Crist to sign the approved budget into law.

Sammy Yearty, the third generation in his family to serve on the Levy County Commission, was sentenced to 33 months in federal prison, three years probation and fined $10,300 on Monday for soliciting and accepting a $10,000 bribe from an undercover FBI agent posing as a developer and lying to the FBI about the bribe.

Flashlight beams revealed the interior walls of the Old Gilchrist County Jail in Trenton to be alive with decay. Layers of lead paint flaked from their surface, giving them the appearance of matted fur, occasionally punctuated by the bodies and spindly legs of spiders. If the walls could have spoken, they would have whispered the words: Get out.

In one of the dark cells on the second floor of the building, three women gathered on the floor around small electronic devices, hoping to see them light up in response to questions they were asking.

An outstanding warrant for Anthony Lee Ralph, a man serving a felony battery sentence, was the undoing of a methamphetamine lab near Rosewood, according to a Levy County Sheriff’s Department press release.

Every 15 seconds a child dies because of the lack of clean water. The Chad Reed Memorial Well will provide clean water to over 1,000 children for the next 20 years.

In honor of fallen Dixie County Sheriff’s Captain Chad Reed, a 5K Run/Walk and BBQ fundraiser will be held on Saturday, June 5, 2010, from 7:30 to 11:30 a.m. at Dixie County High School at 16077 S.E. U.S. Highway 19, in the heart of Cross City.

Capt. Reed was killed in the line of duty, after a lifetime of service in Emergency Services in Dixie and Taylor Counties.

Prompted by pending changes in oyster harvesting regulations that will greatly reduce the amount of time oysters can be harvested during summer months, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has amended a rule that will give oystermen a little extra time each morning.

The new rule allows harvesters to stow their oyster tongs on vessels before dawn, which gives them opportunity to travel early to an oyster bar and begin work at sunrise.

Currently, oyster harvesting is permitted between sunrise and sunset in Florida.